Independence
day
Morocco
Events
of the day
326 – The old St. Peter's
Basilica is consecrated.
401 – The Visigoths, led by king Alaric
I, cross the Alps and invade northern
Italy.
1105 – Maginulfo is elected the Antipope
as Sylvester IV.
1210 – Pope Innocent III excommunicates
Holy Roman Emperor Otto IV
1302 – Pope Boniface VIII issues the Papal
bull Unam sanctam (One Faith).
1307 – William Tell shoots an apple off
his son's head.
1421 – A seawall at the Zuiderzee dike
in the Netherlands breaks, flooding 72
villages and killing about 10,000 people.
This event will be known as Sint-Elisabethsvloed.
1493 – Christopher Columbus first sights
the island now known as Puerto Rico.
1494 – French King Charles VIII occupies
Florence, Italy.
1601 – Tiryaki Hasan Pasha, provincial
governor of Ottoman Empire, utterly defeats
Habsburg forces, commanded by Ferdinand
the Archduke of Austria during the Siege
of Nagykanizsa.
1626 – St. Peter's Basilica is consecrated.
1686 – Charles Francois Felix operates
on King Louis XIV of France's anal fistula
after practicing the surgery on several
peasants.
1730 – Frederick II (known as Frederick
the Great), King of Prussia, is granted
a royal pardon and released from confinement.
1803 – The Battle of Vertières, the last
major battle of the Haitian Revolution,
is fought, leading to the establishment
of the Republic of Haiti, the first black
republic in the Western Hemisphere.
1809 – In a naval action during the Napoleonic
Wars, French frigates defeat British East
Indiamen in the Bay of Bengal.
1863 – King Christian IX of Denmark decides
to sign the November constitution that
declares Schleswig to be part of Denmark.
This is seen by the German Confederation
as a violation of the London Protocol
and leads to the German–Danish war of
1864.
1865 – Mark Twain's short story The Celebrated
Jumping Frog of Calaveras County is published
in the New York Saturday Press.
1883 – American and Canadian railroads
institute five standard continental time
zones, ending the confusion of thousands
of local times.
1903 – The Hay-Bunau-Varilla Treaty is
signed by the United States and Panama,
giving the United States exclusive rights
over the Panama Canal Zone.
1904 – General Esteban Huertas steps down
after the government of Panama fears he
wants to stage a coup.
1905 – Prince Carl of Denmark becomes
King Haakon VII of Norway.
1909 – Two United States warships are
sent to Nicaragua after 500 revolutionaries
(including two Americans) are executed
by order of José Santos Zelaya.
1916 – World War I: First Battle of the
Somme – in France, British Expeditionary
Force commander Douglas Haig calls off
the battle which started on July 1, 1916.
1918 – Latvia declares its independence
from Russia.
1926 – George Bernard Shaw refuses to
accept the money for his Nobel Prize,
saying, "I can forgive Alfred Nobel
for inventing dynamite, but only a fiend
in human form could have invented the
Nobel Prize".
1928 – Release of the animated short Steamboat
Willie, the first fully synchronized sound
cartoon, directed by Walt Disney and Ub
Iwerks, featuring the third appearances
of cartoon characters Mickey Mouse and
Minnie Mouse. This is also considered
by the Disney corporation to be Mickey's
birthday.
1929 – 1929 Grand Banks earthquake: off
the south coast of Newfoundland in the
Atlantic Ocean, a Richter magnitude 7.2
submarine earthquake, centered on Grand
Banks, breaks 12 submarine transatlantic
telegraph cables and triggers a tsunami
that destroys many south coast communities
in the Burin Peninsula.
1930 – Soka Kyoiku Gakkai, a Buddhist
association later renamed Soka Gakkai,
is founded by Japanese educators Tsunesaburo
Makiguchi and Josei Toda.
1938 – Trade union members elect John
L. Lewis as the first president of the
Congress of Industrial Organizations.
1940 – World War II: German leader Adolf
Hitler and Italian Foreign Minister Galeazzo
Ciano meet to discuss Benito Mussolini's
disastrous invasion of Greece.
1940 – New York City's "Mad Bomber"
George Metesky places his first bomb at
a Manhattan office building used by Consolidated
Edison.
1943 – World War II– Battle of Berlin:
440 Royal Air Force planes bomb Berlin
causing only light damage and killing
131. The RAF loses nine aircraft and 53
air crew.
1947 – The Ballantyne's Department Store
fire in Christchurch, New Zealand, kills
41; it is the worst fire disaster in the
history of New Zealand.
1949 – The Iva Valley Shooting occurs
after the coal miners of Enugu in Nigeria
go on strike over withheld wages; 21 miners
are shot dead and 51 are wounded by police
under the supervision of the British colonial
administration of Nigeria.
1961 – United States President John F.
Kennedy sends 18,000 military advisors
to South Vietnam.
1963 – The first push-button telephone
goes into service.
1970 – U.S. President Richard Nixon asks
the U.S. Congress for $155 million USD
in supplemental aid for the Cambodian
government.
1978 – In Jonestown, Guyana, Jim Jones
led his Peoples Temple cult to a mass
murder-suicide that claimed 918 lives
in all, 909 of them in Jonestown itself,
including over 270 children. Congressman
Leo J. Ryan is murdered by members of
the Peoples Temple hours earlier.
1987 – Iran-Contra Affair: the U.S. Congress
issues its final report on the Iran-Contra
Affair.
1987 – King's Cross fire: in London, 31
people die in a fire at the city's busiest
underground station, King's Cross St Pancras.
1988 – War on Drugs: U.S. President Ronald
Reagan signs a bill into law allowing
the death penalty for drug traffickers.
1991 – Shiite Muslim kidnappers in Lebanon
release Anglican Church envoys Terry Waite
and Thomas Sutherland.
1991 – After an 87-day siege, the Croatian
city of Vukovar capitulates to the besieging
Yugoslav People's Army and allied Serb
paramilitary forces.
1993 – In the United States, the North
American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)
is ratified by the House of Representatives.
1993 – In South Africa, 21 political parties
approve a new constitution.
1999 – In College Station, Texas, 12 are
killed and 27 injured at Texas A&M
University when the 59-foot-tall (18 m)
Aggie Bonfire, under construction for
the annual football game against the University
of Texas, collapses at 2:42am.
2002 – Iraq disarmament crisis: United
Nations weapons inspectors led by Hans
Blix arrive in Iraq.
2003 – In the United Kingdom, the Local
Government Act 2003, repealing controversial
anti-gay amendment Section 28, becomes
effective.
Holidays
and observances
Christian
Feast Day:
Abhai of Hach (Syriac Orthodox Church)
Dedication of the Basilicas of Saints
Peter and Paul
Juthwara (Roman Catholic Church)
Mabyn (Roman Catholic Church and Anglican
communion)
Rose Philippine Duchesne (Roman Catholic
Church)
November 5 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
Independence Day, celebrates the independence
of Latvia from Russia in 1918.
Independence Day, celebrates the independence
of Morocco from France and Spain in 1956.
National Day (Oman)
The main day of the Feast of the Virgen
de Chiquinquirá or Chinita's Fair (Maracaibo,
Venezuela)
For details, contact Datacentre
